


Needs Must

by linndechir



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Curses, Kissing, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-22 19:11:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9621620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linndechir/pseuds/linndechir
Summary: Nightingale finds himself put under a curse. Peter is eager to help him break it.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Poetry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Poetry/gifts).



Despite living and working together, Nightingale and I hardly spent every single waking moment around one another. Which was why it took me a few days to realise that something – that _he_ wasn't all right. I'd spent most of the weekend at a big family party my mother had insisted I go to (and even at my age I knew better than to say no when my mother insisted), and what bit of free time I had left was spent on my magic practice, my Latin translations and some leftover paperwork I'd been procrastinating on. And since I had eaten a lot at my relatives', I barely even saw Nightingale during meals. I knew he'd been out and about a few days ago, following up on some lead he hadn't needed me along for, but since he'd never mentioned it again, I assumed that nothing had come from it.

In hindsight, I probably should have noticed that Nightingale didn't look so well the few times I saw him over that weekend. A bit paler than usual, and he seemed somehow tired. As it was, I was pretty surprised when I went searching for him in the general library Monday afternoon and found him looking like he was about to fall asleep on a pile of books. His hair wasn't quite as perfect as usual, and the bags under his eyes were so dark that I winced in sympathy. 

“If I didn't know better, sir, I'd think you spent the weekend partying,” I said and sat down on one of the armchairs. He laughed, but even that sounded hollow.

“What are you reading up on?” I asked when he didn't offer any explanation. The topmost book on the pile, the one Nightingale had been reading – or rather obsessively staring at as if he expected it to reveal the secrets of the universe to him – had a very long title in Latin that I wasn't really focused enough to translate, but I recognised _codex_ and _exsecrationum_ , so codex something something of –

“Curses?” I gave him a surprised look and he nodded miserably. “I didn't know curses existed.”

“Not in the Newtonian tradition,” he said, which explained why I had never heard of any, that is of any real ones. “They've fallen somewhat out of fashion since the Enlightenment, but before that they were very widespread. Newtonian practitioners never liked them much, probably because they couldn't figure out how exactly they worked.”

I looked more closely at him – his cheeks were a bit sunken in, his eyelids dark, his eyes somewhat dull. He didn't just look tired, he looked exhausted. Some copper I was, not noticing that before, but I suppose it's true that you don't really look all that closely anymore at people you see every day, especially not if you sometimes have to make an actual effort not to stare at them too much.

“I take it this isn't purely academic research.”

“No.” The hint of a smile tugged at his mouth. Nightingale was only marginally more interested in academic research than he was in Star Wars and Harry Potter. “Though it wasn't very hard to find out what kind of curse this is.”

I gave him a questioning look, and he seemed somewhat embarrassed when he answered, “I can't sleep. It seems like such a small thing, doesn't it, but after a few days it starts wearing you down.”

Which was a typical Nightingale understatement if I'd ever heard one, considering that sleep deprivation was one hell of a torture method. Nightingale was a lot tougher, physically, than the expensive suits and posh accent let on, but he was still human. I tried to remember just how long you could survive without sleep – I'd read an article once, years ago. I didn't remember it being particularly long.

“Do you know how to break it?” I thought about that for a moment. “You can break curses, right? They're not permanent?”

“Yes,” he said, and I managed not to sigh in relief. “It took me some time to find the exact curse that was used and how to break it, but there's another problem.”

He opened the book again on the page he'd been staring at earlier, turned it towards me and tapped on the page. I wondered why he was bothering with an impromptu Latin lesson instead of just translating or summarising it for me, but I still did my best to read the passage he was pointing out. I read it once, and twice, and then a third time just to make sure before I glanced up at him. He looked somewhat anxious.

“You need …” I didn't want to say it in case I was wrong, but he looked uncomfortable enough that I might have just been right. “You need someone to kiss you?”

“Quite,” he said. He pressed his lips together, which just made me look at them more. They were a little chapped, not as smooth as usual. Not that I paid a lot of attention to how soft Nightingale's lips looked. I tore myself away and closed the book.

“That doesn't sound like much of a problem. You're pretty good-looking, sir, and this is London, you shouldn't have any trouble finding someone willing to kiss you.” Since I still wasn't entirely sure if Nightingale preferred kissing men or women, I added, “And it is the 21st century.”

I couldn't exactly imagine Nightingale dancing at a club with loud electro music, but at a nice bar, the kind people went to because they actually wanted to chat a bit before taking someone home, why not? Especially if a kiss was all that was required. I was pretty sure that Nightingale could have a whole queue of people volunteering to kiss him. If he hadn't been my governor, I probably would have been first in that queue.

“Yes, of course,” he said, and he almost looked more miserable now than before. “But it's been a while.”

I wondered briefly if that was another Nightingale understatement and, if yes, how long “a while” was. A year? Ten? Longer? I'd never even seen Nightingale flirt with someone. I doubted that he'd been on any dates since I'd met him, nor could I imagine him sneaking out of the Folly for quick hook-ups.

“It's not really something you forget how to do, sir,” I said gently, and added with a grin, “And even if you're a terrible kisser, you won't have to tell anyone _before_ the kiss.”

That got me another laugh at least, and even with those dark circles under his eyes his smile was – handsome, yes. No matter how miserable he might look about the prospect, he'd really have no trouble finding someone to kiss him – quite literally – better. He was quiet for a while, thoughtful, and when he spoke again his voice sounded firmer.

“You're right of course, Peter,” he said. “I was looking for an alternative way to break the curse, but there doesn't seem to be one, so I shouldn't dawdle because of any undue sensibilities.”

He didn't look one bit more like he relished the thought of leaving the Folly right now, so in one of my – as it later turned out – better spontaneous moments, I said, “If you don't want to kiss a stranger, sir, I'm right here.”

My mouth had been a lot quicker than my brain, and I think I was about as surprised as Nightingale once I caught on to what I'd just said. Still, I wasn't going to take it back now and shrugged. “It wouldn't exactly be a hardship.”

“I can't ask that of you, Peter,” he said, and I gave him a bit of a look because it wasn't as if we were talking about kinky magic sex rituals or blood sacrifices. There weren't a lot of people I'd refuse to kiss to save them from a potentially life-threatening curse. The fact that I didn't _want_ to kiss most of those other people under normal circumstances was beside the point.

“You're not asking, I'm offering. And my teeth are a lot less scary than Molly's.”

He smiled again, and it was going to be a lot harder from now on to ignore just how kissable that smile was. Instead of letting him argue with me for half an hour, I got up from my armchair, bent down and kissed him. I'd been meaning to plant just a quick kiss on his lips and be done with it, but I found myself lingering to make sure. Who knew how exactly a kiss was defined by the terms of that curse, and I figured it was smarter to do it properly once than to have to do it several times. So I teased his lips with my tongue, let it slip into his mouth when he responded with a pleased sigh. It turned out that Nightingale wasn't a terrible kisser, at all. However long “a while” had been, he must have had a lot of practice before that.

I didn't remember putting my hand on his lapel any more than I remembered when exactly he'd cupped my chin, but it felt nice and I certainly had no objections. In the end I probably kissed him thoroughly enough to get rid of several curses.

“Definitely not a hardship,” I said when our lips finally parted, though our faces were still close enough that I could feel his breath on my skin. He smiled, softer than before, without that tension drawing tight lines around his eyes.

“No,” he said. “Not at all.”

“You think it worked?” I asked. I only felt a little bit bad for almost wishing it hadn't just yet. “Because if it hasn't, I can do that again.”

“I see no reason why it wouldn't have worked,” Nightingale replied. I made myself meet his eyes – he still looked so very tired, but the expression of uncomfortable misery had finally disappeared. “Thank you, Peter.”

I swallowed and still didn't straighten up, but stayed right where I was with my face almost touching his. He didn't turn away either. 

“Any time, sir,” I said. His hand was still on my cheek, his skin a little bit cold, but not unpleasantly so. “I mean that.”

“Please remind me of that in the morning, will you?” 

I almost kissed him again when he smiled at me, but then his eyelids fluttered and closed. I took his hand and laid it carefully down in his lap so he wouldn't yank himself awake when it suddenly dropped from my cheek, and he was already sinking back into the armchair. Under any other circumstances I might have been a little offended that someone fell asleep just as I was about to kiss them, but in the current situation I was more than willing to forgive him. Especially if he would make up for it in the morning.

As I sat back and watched him slip into a deeper slumber, I decided that this particular curse hadn't been so bad after all.


End file.
